The Influence of Friendship and Motor Skill upon the Choice of Te

!BE PROBLEM OF OBTAINING THE INFLUENCE OF FRIENDSHIP AND SKILL ON THE CHOICE OF TEAMMATES Introduction One of the general objectives ot physical education is to develop socially acce

Joanne Gertrude Osmond

Loyola University Chicago

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License Copyright © 1962 Joanne Gertrude Osmond

UPON THE CHOICE OF TEAMMATES

By Joanne G Osmond

A Thesis Submitted to the Faoulty of the Graduate School

of Loyola University in Partial Fulfillment of

the Requirements for the Degree of

Master of Arts

June

1962

born in Burlington, Wisconsin, February 4, 1934 Her childhood and adolescence were spent in the rural community of Antioch,

Illino1s, which 1s f1fty m11es north ot Ch1cago The members at

her family, basically farmers, are interested in the civic and political life of the community

She was graduated from the Antioch ~ownship High School, Antioch, Il11nois, in ~e 1952 During her high school years, the author was: secretary of her Junior Class, president of the G1rls' Athletic Association, had a part 1n the Junior Class play and was a member of the Catholic Youth Organization and Saint

In JUne 1956, at the Un1versity at Michigan, the author ceived the degree ot Bachelor at Science with a major in Physical Education and minors in Health and Chemistry In the summer at

re-1955, she took part in the Counselor in Training Program at

Interlochen, Michigan As an undergraduate, she was active 1n the student government of the campus, serving as the president ot

the dormitory and holding the following campus oftices: Vice President at the Independent Women's Association, and a member at

the Joint Committee of Independent and Sorority Women to study the problem of rushing at the University

ili

From September 1956 to June 1958 she taught PhysIcal tIon at Bremen Township High School, MIdlothIan, IllInoIs MIss Osmond taught the above stated subject at Bloom TownshIp High School, ChIcago Heights, IllInoIs, durIng the school years 1958 through 1961

Educa-The author had been employed durIng the summers ot 1951

through 1956 as: a waitress, a telephone operator for the

Illin01s Bell Telephone Company, a swtmming instructor for the Young Women's ChrIstIan Association, and as a travel agent

Miss OSMond's cultural interests turn to the theater and classical music Other interests include golting, boating,

swtmming, skiing, tennis, horseback riding, and interior ing

decorat-Currently the author is the co-leader ot the Senior Girl Scout Troop number 309 in Blue Island, Illinois, and helping to manage the Osmond Sisters real estate

Doctor Harold Metcalf, superintendent ot Bloom Townahip

High School and Oommunity Oollege, granted permission tor this study; the girls' physical education furnished the students All data used in this thesis was secured through a Motor skill test battery, and the employment ot a sociometric teohnique

Very special thanks are due to the girls' physical tion staft at Bloom Township High School tor their cooperation during the obtaining of the data for this project

educa-v

ship and skill on the choice ot teammates

REVIEW OF THE LITF~TURE • • • • • • • • • • • •

Review ot the literature pertaining to the

use of sociometry in physical education, volleyball skill tests and methods of to~­

ing teams

PROCED1.JRES • e • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •

Description ot the population and procedures

in general Sociometric techniques used

Motor skill tests used Administration ot

sociometric techniques-criterion friendship

Administration of motor skill testse tration of sociometric techniques-criterion teammate

Adminis-ANALYSIS AtID INTERPRETATION OF THE DATA • • • •

Friendship, motor skill, teammate statusese Relation between triendship and teammate statuses Relation between skill and team-mate statuses Relation between skill and friendship statuses

Table Page

I RANGES, I"lEANS, AND STANDARD DEVIATIONS OF

II RANGES, MEANS, AND STANDARD DEVIATIONS OF MOTOR

COEFFICIENTS ON THE FOUR AGE LEVELS, AND THE

LEVEL OF SIGNIFICANCE • • • • • • • • • • • 29

ON THE FOUR AGE LEVELS AND THE LEVEL OF ICANCE • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 30

ON THE FOUR AGE LEVELS AND THE LEVEL OF CANCE • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • 31

vi1

Page

1 ':RENDS OF CORREIA TIOU CORFFICIE!frS ACCORDING TO

'l'HE FOUR CLASS I EVELS , ,

vii!

!BE PROBLEM OF OBTAINING THE INFLUENCE OF

FRIENDSHIP AND SKILL ON THE CHOICE

OF TEAMMATES

Introduction

One of the general objectives ot physical education is to

develop socially acceptable and personally rewarding behaviors,

in and through relationships with others in physical education Each social class has within itself some admired behaviors which are not acceptable to the other classes Because this is true,

there are times when the members ot minority social classes are

rejected tor actions not acceptable to the majority group If a child hopes to gain the social acceptance of a class other than her own, she must be willing to learn to conform to its social patterns Therefore, the ohild must take over the ideas, beliefs, values, and behavior patterns of individuals of the social class with which she wishes to identity herself.l TWelve year old

girls of the higher classes are expected to show a tendency to conform to adult standards of behavior.2 During the same age

period, girls of the lower social group are admired if they are

Company, Inc., New York, 1958), p 295

assertive, pugnacious, attention-getting, bossy and tomboyish 3 Children of the lower social classes have more freedom of choice

in the selection of their friends, than do children ot the middle

c18.s.e whose parents exert pressure on them to choose the "right"

type ot friends." However, a lower class child is often barred

from participation in social activities with those of the other classes Therefore, she is forced to select her friends mainly from her own group.5 Also the barring of the lower class fram the social activities of the other classes causes a non-mingling

of the social groups This forcing of a person to select friends trom within her own group affects her relationships with others

in physical eduoation where team cooperation is stressed

Statement of the Problem and Purpose The idea for the problem of this thesis grew out of an actual class situation at Bloom To~ship High School Bloom Township High School is located in Chicago Heights, Illinois There are

no private institutions of learning in the area except one educat10nal Catholic high school Being an industrial area,

co-therefore, to a large extent the school reflects its

surround-ings The industrial area and its suburbs are composed of people

of differing religions, races, and social classes The high

-school is oomposed of these varying types of people The stueents

of this divergent population are expeoted to work demooratioally together in a publio sohool This is especially true in a physi-oal eduoation olass where team oooperation is stressed

In one of the author's sophomore classes there were many

sooial class conflicts, believed to be due to the non-mingling of the soclal classes It is known that ~e ohoice of teammate is dependent upon the two variables-friendship and skill Though both friendship and physical skill are involved, it 1s desirable

to learn which factor dominates the choice More emphasis given

to the value of physical skill might offset the pressure of ~le

criterion of friendship in the choosing of teammates The dents attending Bloom reoeive credit or failure in physioal edu-cation not a letter grade or a numerical mark This credit is not based, and would never be based, on physical skill alone

stu-It is desirable for the students to recognize the ities of their classmates regardless of race, oreed, or social-eoonomio standing in the oommunity It is hoped that the results

oapabil-of this study oan be used by physioal education teaohers in

guiding their students toward demooratic beliefs, skills in

human relationship, and the reoognition of eaoh person's skills and oapabilities

REVIEW OF THE LI'l'ERATURE PERTA INING TO THE

USE OF SOCIOMETRY IN PHYSICAL EDUCATIO.·

VOLLEYBALL SKILL TESTS, AND METHODS

re-Sociometry in Physical Education Sociometry is a method o~ studying the organization o~ groups Simple techniques are employed in sociometry, and reveal valuable clues ~or e~~ective guidanoe, evaluation o~ this guidanoe, and

existing at a given time among members o~ a given group can be presented simply and graphioally In the presentation the major lines o~ communication and patterns of acoeptanoe and rejection are apparent If the instruotor ~ollows the rules when setting

up te8llls, o~ittees or other groups based on the result s of a

4

sociogram, an inorease in the aoquaintanceship and a deorease in the number of rejeoted persons is likely to be seen Frances E Todd6 found this to be true on the senior high school level dur-i08 a one-semester experimental period The pupils in her study found the sociametrically selected squads more enjoyable and

efficient than any other grouping method they had experienoed

There are two types of sociometric tests found to be

es-pecially adaptable to physical education classes: the anoe volume test, and the functional choice test The acquaint-ance volume test measures the expansiveness of an individual

acquaint-within a given time period The student is asked to list the

first and last names of those she knows in the class This is then repeated at some future time By arithmetical differences

it is readily apparent how many new friends each individual has made.7 The functional choioe test is explained in detail in the follOwing ohapter of this thesis This test requires each girl

to list three of her fellow classmates who are or are desired

friends The student may also rejeot anyone Through this method the lines of communioation, patterns of acoeptanoe and rejeotion, and the individual's status in the olass can be studied The

author of this thesis found in the previous writings, on the

problem of ohoosing teammates, the functional ohoioe test was

6Frances Todd, "Sociometry in Physioal Eduoation," J of D.,

P & R (A.A.H., P.E.R., Washington, D e , May, 1953), XXIV, 24

7-Ibid •

the sociometrio teohnique preferred

Several professionals in the field of physical education have suggested that sociometric techniques are both applioable and

practical in physical education classes Jesse Feirlng Wllliarns8 stated that physical education is education through the physical, not of the ph7sical In this field the effort to eliminate racial and religious bias should operate in all aspects of the activity program Jesse Williams9 wrote that the intelligent planning of programs to reduce opportunity for needless conflict should take into account the techniques of sociometry Sociograms can be a help in organizing a class into a harmonious and productive

group The reliability and val1dity of the sociometric test heve been indicated in several stUdies by Cook, Jennings Moreno, and Zelany In these studies lO the coefficients of reliability ranged

trom .93 to .95 Sabina Breck also suggested the use of metrio techniques in ph7sioal education classes She further

socio-stated that the extent to whioh these measures can contribute to research and teach1ng in the field depends on the clarif1cation

ot the factors whioh influence students' choices 'Jf teammates ll

P.E.R., Washington, D e., May, 1950), XXI, 76

llRuth E Fulton, "Relationship Between Teammate Stat~l~ ~lld

A study was made by Sabina J Breck12 on the relationsh1p between friendsh1p and teammate scores This study 1nvolved 586 college W)men in 1945 The statistics disclose low positive COr-relations of .43 and 57 between friendship and teammate scores

Ardith B Frost13 obtained a correlation coefficient of 40 between friendship and teammate soores She used sooiometric

techniques to determine whether or not skill in the Frenoh and Cooper Repeated Volleys Testl4 was a factor in the cho1ce of

teammates and friends in volleyball classes Frost correlated the scores ot the volleying test and measures of teammates status The correlation coefficients of these two factors were 51 and 50 The correlation coefficients between friendship and volley-ing scores were not s1gnifioantly difterent from zero Fram

these results it would seem that student choices of teammates

are related somewhat to friendship and skill The students seem

to differentiate between the two conditions affeoting status

Frost did not apply the full skill test battery of French and

Cooper This study was completed in 1947

Another study which was made by Ruth E Fultonl5 and

pub-Measures of Skill in Volleyball," The Reaearch Quarterll (A.A.H., P.E.R., Washingto~, D.C., Ootober, 1950), XXI, 214

lished in 1950 involved sixty-four c~llege W)men The French

volleys and serve t~sts were administered; and Fulton extended the measurement of volleyball skill even further by making skill judgments Fulton and the class instruotor made the judgment ot

each student's abIlity The students listed fiv~ members of the class for teammates and all five were given equal oredit for being pioked The oorrelation 54 between the volleying test and the teammate status indioated that the two measures overlap but, are , not measuring exclusively the same variables The volleying test soores oorrelated ~7l with the rating made by the teachers; the soores of teammate status and the rat1ng of skill by th~ teaohers

~orrelated .71 This may mean that one element measured by the teammate status score, which is not measured by the vclleying

soores, i8 a 800ial element The teaoher judgments of skill might

~lso b~ influenced by the social adjustment aspeot

To measure the friendship and teammate statuses of each girl, the functional choice test was selected for this thesis

Volleyball Skill Testa After analyzing the physical skills demanded in the game of volleyball, the two major factors are the abilities to serve and volley These two factors are the basis on which the tests, re-ported in the literature, are formed

Volleyball tests have been de~eloped by Bassett, GlaSSON, and Locke in 1937; Frenoh and Cooper in 1937, Russell and Lange in

1940; Crogen in 1943; and Brady in 1945.16 With the exception of the work by Brady, the volleyball tests listed above have been developed for use with girls and women

Gladys Bassett Ruth Glassow and Mabel Locks17 used the peated volleys test utilizing a starting line six feet from the wall; but thereafter the player could stand anywhere The test consists ot three thIrty second trials Using the best trial

re-out of three a reliability of 84 was found When using the

total of the three trials a 89 reliability was computed The validity was equal to 51 using instructors' ratings This study was conducted wi th college -women

During the same year, French and Cooper18 were developing a repeated volleys and serve test battery To validate the battery, four professionals in physical education used a cheek list to

judge the skills of a number of high school girla This is an accepted procedure for validating motor skill tests The validity

on the serving test was reported as 83, and for the repeated

volleys 72 Reltability of the serve test was 68, and tor the repeated volleys 78 to 96 The test setup permits ten trials

l6National Research Council of the Research Section, ment and Avaluation Materials in HealthL Physical Education and Reoreation (N.E.A., Washington, D.C., 1950), p 71

Measut!-17DOrotby R Mohr and Martha J Haverstiok, "Repeated volleys Tests for Women's Volleyball," !he Research Quarterly, (A.A.H.,

P.E.R •• Washington D.C., May 1955) XXVI, 180

l8National Reaearch Council of the Researoh Section p 71

on the repeated ,volleys test and ten trials should be allowed on the serve test There is a restraining line ten feet in length and three feet from the wall,'whioh the player must stay behind during the test

The volleyball test battery of Frenoh and Cooper was modified

by Elizabeth Lange and Naomi Hussell19 for use in the seventh, eighth, and ninth grades The repeated volleys test was ohanged

to three trials of thirty seconds eaoh This reduced the testing

time by one minute.' 'l'he serving test was ohanged to two trials eaoh oonsisting of ten serves The inorease in time needed for the serve test was partly oompensated for by the first modifica-

tion The validity and reliabIlity approximates that of the

Frenoh and Cooper battery

Three years later Crogen20 reported a repeated volleys test for high sohool girls.' It is a one-item test whioh was a varia-tion of the repeated volleys The player started from beh:f.nd a six foot restraining line, but she oould move anywhere thereafter There was no time faotor The player volleyed repeatedly for a speoified number of hits suoh as ten, twenty-fiv~ or thirty The soore was the number of fouls substraoted from the speoified

number of hits The validity was based on the ability to play

19Kaomi Russell and ~izabeth Lange, "Achievement Testa in Volleyball for Junior High Sohool Girls," The Research Quarterly (A.A.H., P.E., ft., WashIngton, D.C., Deoember 1940), p 33

20National Research Counoil of the Researoh Section, p 71

volleyball in a competitive situation Those who scored high on this test won more games than the player~ who seored low The rel1abilities with 129 high school girls ranged from .48 to .52

for ten hits and for twenty hits 83.21 Scores were found to

tm-prove with practice and refleoted the player's experience

Brady22 made an aotivity analysis of volleyball as played by college men His study on the repeated volleys test used 522

college men and fifteen Young Men's Christian Association expert players There were no floor restrictions to his test The time limit was one minute The skill of these players was on a higher ability level than that n.eded for high school girls Therefore, the author of this thesis could not apply Brady's test to her

study

A seven foot restraining line to limit body buIld advantage

In the repeated volleys test was suggested by Dorothy Mohr and Martha Haverstiok23 as reported in 1955

The French and Cooper volleyball test battery is objeotive and involves only one performer It is easily administered and

scored The battery has aoceptable reliability and validity whioh was standardized on the high sohool level This battery tests two important skills in girls' volleyball as played on the high school level Because French's and Cooper's battery covers two

22 Ibid •

23Ibid., p 184 •

skills, it indioates the students' ab~.lity more completely than

a one-item test

If the height of a girl is an advanta3e in playing volleyball, then this should be to the player's advantage in any skill test Therefore, before Dorothy Mohr's and Martha Haverstiok's augges-tion (to limit body build advantage in testing) is followed in the repeated volleys test more research should be done

Russell and Lange modified the volleyball test battery of French and Cooper The modifications involve twioe as many serve test trials whioh require more apace than the repeated volleys test The serve test does not require much time per pupil

However, if as in this study, 441 girls are to be tested on three courtA, twioe as many ~1."ie.18 woo Id make the administering much more diffioult The rellabI1ities and validitIes of the Frenoh and Cooper, and the Russell and Lange tests are about equal

Crogen's repeated volleys test is a one-item test fore, it does not oover as completely the skills necessary in

There-volleyball as does a test bat-tery such 8.$ the F'ranch and Cooper battery-

Brady's volleyball test is designed for men and is therefore not applicable to the study in this thesis

Gladys Bassett, Ruth Glassow and Mabel Locke conducted a

study using oollege women This is again a one-item test

volleys and serve test battery by Frenoh and Cooper was chosen to

measure the skill of the girls involved in this study

Methods ot Forming Teams The author ot this thesis desired to further explore the

faotors involved when the students ohoose teammates without the influenoe ot the teaoher

Many ways of forming teams oan be found Basioally there are five major methods ranging from teaoher seleotion to the pupils' oontrol The five methods are as follows:

.1 The instructor may divide the pupils into teams and point the oaptains with little regard to the pupils'

ap-wishes

2 The girls may be separated into teams and eaoh team eleots its own oaptain

3 The oaptains are appointed, and they ohoose the teaMS

either in private or in front of the olass

4 The students eleot the oaptains, and then the oaptains ohoose the teams

5 The sooiometric approaoh

·-!n the sociometrio approaoh eaoh girl may privately indioate her ohoioe of teamm~ in writing The teaoher then forms the

teams aooording to eaoh girlls wish With this last method, the oaptain may be eleoted by the team, or appointed by the teaoher (taking into oonsideration the girl most frequently selected by

eaoh group)

24

By applying the sociometric technlques, Prances Todd found

an increase in Rcquaintanceship and a decrease in the number ~f unpopulhr girls durint?; a one-semester experimental period on the sen.ior high school level The pupils !'ound the sociometrically selected teams more enjoyable and more efficient than other

grouping methods they had experienced

The fifth method described was seleoted for the researoh of this thesis because of the lack of teacher influence upon the choice of teammates which gives a truer picture of the girls' wishes By using the sociometric technique of choosing teams an individual status index can be computed to show each girl's team-mate statu within the class Th1s is the only method which will lead to a figure for mak1ng comparisons The sociometric technique 1s also objective 1n that 1t does not depend upon the influence of the teacher For these reasons the sociometrie technique was selected for use in this thesis

A review of the literature shows no study on the high school level in which friendship status and volleyball skill were corre-lated rl th teammate status Therefore, it was considered proti t-able to conduct the present study

24 Todd, p 24

PROCEDURES OF TESTING THE INFLUENCE OF FRIENDSHIP AND MOTOR SKILL ON THE

25Sarold H Metcalf School Characteristics and Profile ot

Class of 1961 (Bloom 'rOtmship High School, Fall 1961), p 14t

15

faoulty and administration

In 1961 the size of the graduating olass was 692 Forty-eight per oent of this olass attend 66 oolleges, and two peroent attend sohools of nursing.26 This indioates the oommunity has a desire for higher eduoation for its ohildren A proof of this desire is the Bloom Community College

The partioular talents of eaoh ohild are oonsidered in the eduoational program Aooelerated programs are offered in English, mathematios and soienoe Ability groupings are given in English mathematios, soienoe Amerioan history, and homemaking Girls' physioal eduoation olasses are heterogeneous The sooial emo-tional, physioal, and mental aspeots of eaoh ohild are an integral part ot the program

Ten people make up the guidanoe personnel "Guidanoe

per-sonnel and individual teaohers assist eaoh student with realistic educational and vooational planning ac'oording to the need of the student."27 The olass load ot twenty-eight pupils brings a olose relationship between teaoher and pupil

To find the ooeffioients ot oorrelation for friendship and teammates, five progressive steps were used in the project during the gathering of the material They were as follows:

1 Choosing ola to partioipate and the granting of

00-operation from the teaohers

2 Filling out friendShip oards by the stUdents

3 Administering the Frenoh and Cooper volleyball battery

4 Filling out teammate cards by the stUdents

a Computing the correlation ooeffioients

The coeffioient of correlation for motor skill and friendship was figured as a check

A detailed description of the a.aments composing the study,

in order of their occurrence, comprise the remainder of this

ohapter

Sociometric Techniques Used The relationships based on friendship and desired teammate existing among the classmates had to be determined for this study This called for the use of sociometry The functional choice test

is a means of fInding out who wants to be with wham not just who

is wi th whom

The criterion for the student's choice should be clearly

stated, but may vary with the teacher's purpose In this study the criteria for the two separate listings were clearly stated

as friendship in the first instance and teammates in the second oase

There are several ways of tabulating the findings such as a matrix chart, sociograms, individual status index and the group cohesion score.2S The author felt the individual status index

28

Todd, p 24

to be the most effective for this study Because this method volves finding a number, she felt it to be the most conorete

in-method for making oomparisons

In order to find this number the following operation was employed The individual student ohose, aooording to the ori-terion, three of her olassmates by writing their names in the order of preferenoe The student had the opportunity to rejeot anyone by writing the name of the person on the bottom section ot

the oard A tally was then made of the number of times eaoh

student was chosen and rejected The individual status index was then computed from this tally sheet This index was equal to the total number of times eaoh student was chosen by the other members of the class, minus the total number of times rejected, divided by the number of pupils in the class minus on •• 29

Through the use of the individual status index, eaoh dent's r~lationahip with her classmates was determined In addi-tion, it was round, to what degree the student waa a desired

stu-teammate

Motor Skill ~e.ts Used Atter reviewing many skill tests in the area ot volleyball, the author chose the battery by French and Cooper.30 This bat-

29 Ibid., p 36 •

30Gladys M Soott and &sther Frenoh, Evaluation in Ph!sioal EdUcation (0 V Mosby Oompany, St Louis, 1950), p 147.1 1

tery was composed of the repeated volleys and serve tests To validate the battery, four professionals in physical education used a check list to judge the skills of a number of high school age girls This waa an accepted procedure for validating motor skill tests The validating of this battery on high school age girls waa one reason for the choosing of this test The battery yielded a validity coefficient ot 81 for the serve and repeated volleys using instructors' ratings The reliability of the re-

pe~ted volleys was reported as .18 and that of the serve test was

.68

The score for the repeated volleys skill test was the sum

ot the five beat trials out of ten The ball had to be clearly batted by the participant who stood three feet or further fram the wall The ball had to hit the wall at a point higher than seven and one-half feet from the floor These two measurements were marked by tape ten feet long The tape on the wall, above whioh the ball had to hit in order to be oounted, was equal in

, '

height to a volleyball net; and is referred to hereafter as the net line The participant, standing behind the tape on the floor, started each trial by an underhand toss of the ball directing it above the net line She volleyed the ball repeatedly against the wall above the net line for fifteen seconds If the ball went out ot control, it had to be recovered by the subject and brought back to the three foot line to be started over as at the begin-ning Each trial waa fifteen seconds in length The soore for one trial was the number of times the ball was clearly batted, not tossed, from behind the three foot line on the floor to the

wall above or on the net 11ne As stated before, the score for the test was the sum of the five best trials out of ten

~~e second test in the battery, the serve test measures

the subject's ability to serve accurately In this test the point value given to each serve depended upon where the ball hit the court The number of paints given eaoh trial ranged rrom zero to five In a game situation the value of a serve depends upon i~8

effectiveness A ball served to the back of the court is more effective than one served to the front During the serve skill test, the score received for a trial corresponded to its effec-tiveness in a game situation The court was divided into seven sections and the score v8.lues of each area were clearly marked

on the tloor Diagram 1 shows the court markings The etudents could see the markings Therefore, they knew where to serve

the ball to receive the highest point value To take the serve test the participant stood in the proper serving area on the

oourt oppos1te the target Any legal serve was permitted A

foot fault, "let" serve, or a ball hit out of bounds were oounted

as trials with the pOint values ot zero A ball which landed on

a line separating two spaces scored the higher value Each girl was given ten trials ~e soore for the serve test was the total

of the ten trials

Diagram 1 Court Markings - Serve Test

of the school could not be interrupted

After the selection at the clas.e., each gIrl was asked to fill out an 1ndex card, 11sting In the order of preference, three persons 1n her class WhOM she wanted or had as friends At the bottom of the card was a blank to be filled In, it there were

anyone in the clas8 with wham they absolutely could not be friend8 The name, class, age level, and teacher of each student was filled

in at the top of the card This method, the functlonal choice t.st, Is a means of fInding out who wants to be with whom and not just who 1s wi th whom The sociograms formed from the above 1n-

fo~ation from each class involved showed only friendAhips, not teammates By follo'wing the formula g1 ven in the article ffSociom.-etry in Physioal Educationlt by Frances rrOdd,:31 the ~.ndfvidua1

'l'ne girls were told they were pal~tlcipBoting in this stUdy so t.he author might use the ma°i;erial in her thesis 'they understood

no ohange in the olass routine or reprisal would occur because of the results So thf:t stUdent would not become apprehensive over the results, they were not instructed on the next steps to be carried out The girls also understood this was not to be a

popularity contest The results of the sociogr8l11s were heldo in strictest confidenoe, and the students were infouned of this

fact It was assumed, therefore, that as much ~xpres.ion of true

f •• lings a8 possible were obtained in this si\iuation

Administration of the Motor Skill Tests

Th volleyball skill test battery by Frenoh and cooper32 was administered after the friendship cards were completed All the basl0 instructions for this volleyball skill test batte17 were given by the author to all of the classes During the test-ing each student had a chance to observe the skills ot others This battery, being composed ot two tests, was carried out in two separate gy,mnaslums Whenever possible, according to the

32Scott a~d French, pp 147-151

school schedule, the classes in the project were divided into two groups Each group completed one segment and then Uley exchanged areas to take the second part of the batteX'Y

seldom given skill tests as a part of their class work Host of the girls from fresI~en to seniors~-seemed particularly inte~­

ested in this part of the project They desired to know their skill level and that of their classftlates; and gave each other encouragement to do better

At the beginning of this second part of the project each teacher told her class that every member's physical skill l.evel

in volleyball would be determined The girls' nmnes with the three highest scores of the class were read by the teacher after the battery was finished Announced were the high scores for each of the age levels and also how the four age levels ranked in physical ability in volleyball according to this stUdy By ob-serving their classmates while the battery was in process, the girls made their own judgments concerning the results to be found

by this section of the project

There were thirteen stations laid out for the giving of the repeated volleys test Score sheets were mimeographed and

thirteen girls, one for each station, were appointed to record the scores One of the two teachers of the classes involved each period was in charge of timing; whereas the other teacher super-vised the recording